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Grab a ‘VAT Free’ Skoda Octavia

In yet another ‘Sign of the times’ Skoda has announced that they are now offering ‘VAT Free Octavias’ until the end of the year. No, this is not a tie-up between Alistair Darling and VW, it’s just Skoda’s way of offering a headline price decrease of a bit over 13% (less expensive to Skoda than last week for the same headline, to be fair, and there is a new model due in January!). Grab a VAT free Skoda Octavia I’m pretty sure that there will be a raft of these ‘VAT Free’ offers floating around on everything from cars to washing machines, capitalising on the fact the VAT is in the headlines.

Suzuki Swift Sport (2011) first official picture

This is the new Suzuki Swift Sport, a lovely little hot (well, warm) hatch that will be officially revealed at the 2011 Frankfurt motor show in September. And you can forget about the current crop of turbocharged and big power-chasing hot hatches – this Swift Sport uses a naturally aspirated engine good for just 134bhp… 134bhp! I know the last Suzuki Swift Sport wasn’t big on power but Minis and VXR Corsas boast over 200bhp… Yes, but that’s not the point.

Michelin Challenge Design 2009 preview

Michelin is continuing to profile the work of some of the leading contenders for its annual Michelin Challenge Design competition, which asks the design community to come up with proposals for "America's Next Iconic Vehicle". All 11 of the scale models and 24 two-dimensional drawings in the running will be exhibited at the 2009 NAIAS in January. Earlier this month, we featured three of these scale models following their selection by a jury of top automotive designers.